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<br />the current state and federal regulatory program which requires that the reclaimed plant <br />community must have only similar and not identical functions and values. <br />As an alternative comparison, the proposed species diversity standard found on pages <br />13-14 of the "Guidelines for Compliance with Land Use and Vegetation Requirements of <br />the Colorado Mined Land Reclamation Board for Coal Mining" issued in June of 1988 <br />specifically addresses the issue of warm season grasses as a component of species <br />diversity from a slightly different prospective. Using this method, the number of warm <br />species grasses comprising more than 3 percent relative cover in the reference area <br />would be the proposed standard. Using the original 1980 baseline data and monitoring <br />data collected in 1987 and 1997 for the Grassland Reference Area results in a warm <br />season species standard of 2 warm season grasses. Application of this criteria to these <br />current monitoring data would result in every site satisfying the warm season grass <br />diversity standard. <br />CONCLUSIONS <br />Data collected during vegetation sampling conducted in 1997 from the 1983, 1987, <br />January 1992, November 1992 and 1995 reclaimed areas at the Southfield Mine suggests <br />that the 1987 Reclamation Seeding shows a similar amount of total plant cover, <br />production when compared to the older 1983 Reclamation Seeding. Upon comparing <br />these values with the data collected from the Grassland Reference Area, evidence <br />suggests that all of the reclaimed sites satisfy the apparent revegetation success criteria <br />with respect to total plant cover, forage production and species diversity. These data <br />suggest that if future successional trends regarding the revegetation success for these <br />reclamation seedings remain similar to current ones, basic parts of the disturbed <br />landscape will be restored in a relatively short period of time and that the land capability <br />has the potential to be improved. <br />The 1983 Reclamation Seeding that was monitored and compared with data collected at <br />the same site in 1987, 1989 and 1991, shows a progressive increase in total plant cover <br />from 30.2 percent to 41.4 percent total plant cover. Forage production was determined <br />to equal 1,770 pounds of air dry forage in 1997, 783 pounds in 1991 and 661 pounds <br />from the 1989 sampling. These data suggest an increase in perennial plants growing on <br />these sites is occurring through the processes of natural plant succession. This is evident <br />in the declines in the percent of annual plant growth encountered on these sites and the <br />corresponding increase in perennial plants. Forage production has continued to increase <br />over time and the total production values from these reclaimed areas exceed the values <br />obtained from the Grassland Reference Area. This indicates that production values are <br />still satisfactory and largely equivalent to those found in undisturbed areas. <br />Species diversity appears to pose a potential problem with respect to final bond release <br />when the current warm season grass criteria is applied to these data. All of the reclaimed <br />sites meet the established species diversity standards for the four dominate plants. <br />8 <br />